A Study of Communicative Strategies of Thai and Filipino Teachers of English

There are many non-native English language teachers communicating with each other on a daily basis in English. The communicative strategies of non-native English language teachers can be easily identified. This study investigated the communicative strategies used by Thai and Filipino teachers. This research focused on the teacher’s interaction, the framework of communicative strategies of ASEAN English as a Lingua Franca (ELF) speaker, and the lack of studies in communicative strategies. In addition, the study aimed to investigate the significant relationship and communicative strategies between intercultural teaching personnel. The population sample consisted of Thai and Filipinos teachers who provide classroom instruction in English. The research tools used to collect data included a questionnaire, observations during two pair speaking tasks, and a Jigsaw task. A stimulated recall interview was performed after the tasks. All conversations and interactions were recorded and then transcribed. The results revealed that as listeners, “Listen to the message” was ranked the highest among the communicative strategies used by both the Thai and Filipino teachers. As speakers, “Non-verbal language” was ranked the highest for the Thai teachers; while, “Persuasion” was most frequently used by the Filipino teachers. A Chi-square test showed that there was a statistically significant relationship between communicative strategies used by the Thai and Filipino teachers. Based on the findings of the study, communicative strategies identified in this study should be incorporated into English curriculums and English language teaching in Thailand. Educators, teachers, and non-native English learners should adopt these communicative strategies to promote mutual understandings in the ELF context.

stated that the language of ELF speakers should not be viewed as incompetent by ENL, but as capable in expanding the appropriateness of exchanging ideas and feelings when using the English language which enables its users to express themselves without having to conform to sociocultural norms of other social groups. Although English is spoken globally, mutual intelligibility allows speakers of different languages to understand and coexist with each other. The communication strategies used during interactions are acceptable as long as individuals of different linguistic and cultural backgrounds can socialize with each other.

Communication Strategies
The term "communication strategies" was first introduced by Selinker (1972) in the concept of interlanguage. He stated that very few language learners ever achieve native-like language proficiency. In their attempts to communicate in meaningful situations, learners produce imperfect language which contains features of both their native and target languages. Moreover, the uses of communication strategies for second language learners are when the learner attempts to communicate an idea, feeling, or need in a target language without the necessary linguistic skills to achieve complete understanding of the message they are attempting to share with a second party. There have been different aspects and taxonomies to classify communication strategies as shown in various ELF studies.

Communication Strategies Studies in ELF Context
Communication strategies in English as a lingua franca practices were widely accepted. Researches on ELF pragmatics reveal use of common interactional strategies like Repetition, Paraphrase, Comprehension checks, Code-switching, Explanations, and Clarifications can be beneficial for communication among second language users to improve the intrapersonal working atmosphere.
During the research carried out by Cogo (2009), Accommodation strategies, such as Other-repetition and Code-switching, were her focus. She stated that the act of accommodating to certain shared variants in the local context, rather than conforming to some ideal notion of correctness, may not only ensure intelligibility between interlocutors, but also signal solidarity between them. Hanamoto (2014) categorized Repetition into two categories: Self-repetitions and Other-repetitions. Kirkpatrick (2010) nevertheless discovered the strategy Request repetition which was adopted by listeners while repetition was mostly adopted by speakers.
Even Code-switching in Second Language Acquisition (SLA) theory is a strategy for learners with lower proficiency levels in spoken English. Gross (2000) and Myers-Scotton (2000) asserted that Code-switching from a sociolinguistic perspective is an expression of the bilingual or multilingual competence of the participants (and not of their deficiency) being able to draw on their multifaceted linguistic repertoire.
The Clarification strategy was shown in many studies. Kaur (2015) stated that participants repeated themselves in specific ways that reflect an attempt to be clear and comprehensible to their interlocutors. Dunworth and Kwan (2016) claimed that what can be defined as active strategies, such as Clarification, Repetition, and Direct questioning, are more successful in achieving effective communication from a transactional perspective.
Requests for confirmation and Confirmation checks are used to ensure that the received information from the previous utterance has been heard or understood correctly (Björkman, 2014;Cheng & Warren, 2009;Jamshidnejad, 2011). Norrick (2012) furthermore observed that rising intonation expresses a confirmation check, while falling intonation indicates a need for confirmation or clarification (Svennevig, 2003(Svennevig, , 2004. According to Kaur (2010), Paraphrase expresses the same content in a modified or changed form to facilitate recipient understanding. Paraphrasing has been defined differently by several researchers: Self-rephrasing ); Self-reformulation and Other-reformulation (Chiang & Mi, 2011);or Other-initiated (Björkman, 2014). Firth (2009) and Seidlhofer (2001) mentioned that non-understanding might not only be overcome through a particular modification pattern; rather, a few different modifications and negotiation of meaning may be necessary for successful communication among the interlocutors. As mentioned above, Hanamoto (2014) found that her participants also applied Clarification after a Confirmation check in order to make sure that the interlocutor understood her clearly.

Communication Strategies Studies in Thailand
In the Thailand context, a diverse collection of communication strategies is easily found among the multilingual speakers. The usage of Approximation, Circumlocution, Paralinguistic, Avoidance, Appeal for help and Language switching by Thais were frequently implemented in conversations with non-native and native English speakers.
Approximation was identified in data collection of Luangsaengthong (2002) during his research of Thai undergraduate students with L3 language switch, and the study of Prapobratanakul and Kangkun (2011) who investigated use of communication strategies of young Thai students. Pornpibul (2005) mentioned that the major factors in Approximation were the participants' vocabulary knowledge and what they gain from the strategy. Nevertheless, using Approximation could lead to some levels of understanding. Wannaruk (2003) who concentrated on both high proficiency students and low proficiency students found that Circumlocution was used more frequently by high proficiency learners than low proficiency learners. Pornpibul (2005) also informed that the factor in using Circumlocution was the proficiency of the participants, and what the participants gained through the strategy was being able to communicate more clearly and effectively. Circumlocution was viewed as a kind of intralinguistic strategies (Prapobratanakul and Kangkun, 2011).
Paralinguistic strategies were most frequently used in the study of Prapobratanakul and Kangkun (2011). Moreover, Wannaruk (2003) stated that Paralinguistic strategies were used at a higher frequency in low proficiency learners than high proficiency students. Pornpibul (2005) who used the word Nonlinguistic signals instead of Paralinguistic found that this strategy was applied when the participants were dealing with objects and actions that involved for unknown or unfamiliar English words.
Appeal for help was in the study of Somsai and Interaprasert (2011) in which they categorized this strategy into Continuous interaction strategies for conveying a message to the interlocutor. Pornpibul (2005) mentioned that whether Appeal for help would help them achieve their communicative goals or not depending largely on which person was providing the help.
Language switching or Code-switching was in the study of Wannaruk (2003) who mentioned that this strategy was mostly used by lower proficiency learners. Somsai and Interaprasert (2011) who used the phrase switching some unknown words or phrases into Thai for this strategy asserted that this strategy is likely to provide positive effects on language learning.
Many of the past studies lacked communication strategies for the listeners when it came to conversations. Most studies focused on the speaker's aspects of a conversation and left out the listeners as a component of a dialogue. However, the communicative strategies developed by Kirkpatrick (2010) can be regarded as a perfective and comprehensive characterization since it takes both listeners and speakers into consideration.

The Framework of Communicative Strategies by Kirkpatrick
The framework of communicative strategies by Kirkpatrick (2010) was from audio-recordings of six group discussions which included ASEAN members. The subjects were all English language teachers who had attended a development course relating to English language teaching conducted by staff at the Regional Language Centre (RELC) in Singapore. They shared a range of non-standard forms and proficiency levels of elt.ccsenet.org English Language Teaching Vol. 14, No. 12; spoken English. The strategies discovered from the study were categorizes into two groups to cope with listening and speaking problems.
The communicative strategies used to cope with listening problem were Lexical anticipation, Lexical suggestion, Lexical correction, Don't give up, Request repetition, Request clarification, Let it pass, Listen to the message, Participant paraphrase, and Participant prompt.
The communicative strategies used to cope with speaking problem were Spell out the word, Repeat the phrase, Be explicit, Paraphrase, and Avoid local/ idiomatic referents.
Other than the sixteen strategies from Kirkpatrick's framework, six strategies were established in this study.

Brush off (Communicative Delayed Response Syndrome) CDRS
"Brush off", a term created for use in this communicative strategy approach in this study, is related to a communicative delayed response between the sender and the receiver. "Brush off" occurs when a participant could not immediate response; which, provides the opportunity for the sender or receiver to have the needed time to create a response. The details are shown in Extracted Recording (ER) #12.

Language switching
Language switching occurs when multilingual speakers switch between language varieties, in the context of a single dialogue. Wannaruk (2003) noted that Language switching was mostly used by lower proficiency English language learners. Language switching also allows individuals to feel more comfortable and not feel the need to pretend to speak exemplary English. Details are shown in ER #13 and 14.

Self-Lexical correction
Self-Lexical correction is different from Lexical correction in Kirkpatrick's study. Lexical correction occurs when the listeners attempt to correct their interlocutor while Self-Lexical correction occurs when speakers attempt to correct themselves after saying incorrect words. Details are shown in ER #17.

Non-verbal language
Non-verbal language is useful in a variety of ways. A key purpose of Non-verbal languages is to help support the verbal language. The elements of Non-verbal languages are also effective in exhibiting a multitude of cognitive attitudes, even deescalating tension. Details are shown in ER #18, 19 and 20.

Persuasion
Persuasion strategy seems necessary for ELF discourse in order to avoid gaps in conversations. The strategy helps the interlocutors to feel free to talk. It is often adopted by individuals with a higher English proficiency, or those that are more confident regardless of their English competency. Details are shown in ER #21, 22 and 23.

Change of topic
Changing of topic is a useful strategy in the ELF discourse as it allows interlocutors to bypass situations where they are not able to understandably continue a dialogue with the other person. The examples and details are shown in ER #24.
The communication strategies in this study concentrated on both the speaker and the listener according to Kirkpatrick's framework so to help expand the knowledge in this field of study. Since Kirkpatrick used the term "communicative strategies" instead of "communication strategies", this study will also use the term communicative strategy going forward.

Objectives
1) To investigate the communicative strategies used by Thai and Filipino teachers as both listeners and speakers who work in a Thai school cultural environment 2) To investigate significant relationship between communicative strategies used by Thai and Filipino teachers as listeners and speakers

Research Design
This research employed the mixed-method research design to investigate Thai and Filipino teachers' communicative strategies used in their daily communicative settings. Therefore, the explanatory sequential design was adopted. The explanatory sequential design according to Creswell & Plano Clark (2011) consists of collecting quantitative data and then compiling qualitative data to elaborate on the quantitative results.

Research Setting and Participants
The research setting was at a primary school in Uthai Thani province during the academic year 2020. The inclusion criteria consisted of: 1) Thai and Filipino teachers who had similar classroom educational responsibilities in an English context; 2) participation in the study was voluntary. An exclusion criterion was also available in which the participants could withdraw from this study at any time for any reason. The population sample in this study consisted of five Thai and five Filipino teachers employed at Anubanmuang Uthaithani School for at least one year. A Thai and a Filipino teacher were randomly matched up resulting in five paired groups. Purposive sampling was used to select the five Filipino teachers in this study. However, random sampling was used to select the five co-teachers from the school's Mini-English Program.

Instrument
Three research instruments were used in this study. The research subset instruments consisted of:

Data Collection Procedures
The data was collected during the participants' free time. The paired speaking tasks and the Jigsaw task were documented through video and audio recordings. The recordings featured non-related work issues and carried out in a quiet room following standard Cambridge FCE test practices. After the Human Ethics Committees of Naresuan University's research approval was obtained, a pilot study was carried out to verify or modify the research instruments for the main study. Since the two speaking tasks did not result in natural conversations and interactions, a more comprehensive Jigsaw task was created after the pilot study. Participants were informed of the research objectives, asked for permission to record all session, and asked to sign consent forms to confirm that their participation in the study was voluntary. All the participants completed a background questionnaire first, then subsequently completed the paired speaking and the Jigsaw task. Afterwards, each pair was subjected to a stimulated recall interview.

Data Analysis
The video and audio recording of the participants were used for documentation purposes. The recordings were then transcribed and categorized using the analytical tool developed by Kirkpatrick (2010), which employed Conversation Analysis (CA). The data from the transcribed recordings and stimulated recall interview were converted into percentages, and used to establish the significant relationships. The value amounts associated with communicative strategies were statistically analyzed using Chi-square (X 2 ).  Listen to the message was ranked the highest among the communicative strategies used by both the Thai teachers (58.62%) and Filipino teachers (50.88%) as listeners. However, it was interesting that Brush off and Language switching were only used by Thai teachers; while Lexical corrections and Participant paraphrase were only used by Filipino teachers. The result from Chi-square test showed that there was a statistically significant relationship between communicative strategies used by the teacher pairs as listeners (X 2 =17.607, p<0.05). showed that Non-verbal language was frequently used by the Thai teachers when communicating. This form of communications was ranked the highest among the Thai teachers (50.00%) while the Persuasion strategy was ranked the highest (45.45%) among the Filipino teachers as speakers. Nevertheless, Self-Lexical correction and Change of topic were only used by the Thai teachers; whereas, Spell out the word and Be explicit were only used by the Filipino teachers. A Chi-square test showed a statistically significant relationship between communicative strategies used by the Thai and Filipino teachers. (X 2 =12.022, p<0.05).

Lexical anticipation
Lexical anticipation shows that the participants shared similar principles concerning the topic being discussed which helped their communications flow. This strategy is exemplified in the Extracted Recording (ER) #1. First, T3 anticipated the sentence 'You die' to complete F3's sentence. However, this case did not show that F3 had a lower ability of using the language, but it did indicate there was a difference in the case regarding the agreement of their idea and opinions. F5 in ER #2 also correctly anticipated the phrase 'Bad words' for T5 since T5 was not able to come up with the appropriate words.
(1) While discussing the most difficult profession to get to the top, F3 pointed out that becoming a doctor was the most difficult one and then tried to explain that decision. T3 however, agree with F3, so she anticipated the completion of F3 sentence with 'you die'.

F3
Yeah! Doctor is (very, very!) difficult. Once you make a mistake… T3 You die.

F3
So, you need to be careful.
(2) In this extract, the teachers were talking about T5 having a part-time job as a singer after school. T5 explained the differences in his approach towards being a teacher and being a singer at a restaurant. He tried to clarify that when he worked at night, he could use some rude and often impolite words. However, during this exchange, he could not come up with an appropriate word that meant rude and impolite, so F5 anticipated the completion of his sentence by saying 'Bad words' as followed:

Lexical correction
ER #3 provides an example of Lexical correction. Here, F4 provided the correct pronunciation of clothes (/kləʊðz/) instead of close (/kləʊz/) as T4 did. However, his primary motive was to ensure successful communication rather than to correct the speaker.
(3) While trying to complete the town map, F4 wanted to know where the clothes shop was. T4 answered that the blank space was the clothes shop. However, T4 pronounced clothes incorrectly, so F4 provided the correct pronunciation of clothes (/kləʊðz/) instead of close (/kləʊz/).

F4
What's that? What shop is that?

Don't give up
ER #4 shows the lengths that participants worked together to ensure they understood each other. This strategy demonstrated how the participants repetitively pronounce the vocabulary (flower shop, library, and coffee shop) together to help improve their understanding.
(4) This pair had a difficult time navigating the town map task. However, after 20 minutes, they were able to successfully complete the task. Once the town map details were correctly filled out, they pronounced the words together, and there was a sense of accomplishment as they continued onto further completing communitive directions in the town map task.

F2
And then across music store to the left will be… F2/T2 (simultaneously) … flower shop.

F2
So flower shop across down, that will be stadium.

T2
Across stadium to the right is clothes shop.

T2
Drug store is between post office and Movie Theater.

F2
And then across coffee shop to the right is train station.

T2
Across train station is temple.

Request repetition
There are situations where individuals do not understand each other, and one of them would use the Request repetition strategy. The utterance of 'Huh?' with a rising tone in ER #5 by T1 is an example of this strategy that signaled she was not sure what exactly was spoken by F1. F1 responded by repeating her statement 'a Japanese restaurant'. (5) In this extract, F1 and T1 were trying to complete the town map. T1 wanted to know what the empty box below the movie theater was, and where the drugstore was. However, T1 could not understand the pronunciation, so she wanted F1 to repeat by saying 'Huh?'

F1
I want to know next to the drug store.

T1
Movie Theater. I want to know down the movie theater and the drug store. The big box.

F1
That's a Japanese restaurant.
Since T1 was not clear of F1 pronunciation, she uttered … T1 Huh?
In some of the cases, participants also signaled a request for a clearer understanding by way of repetition by using 'Again?' as in ER #6.

Request clarification
Request a clarification occurrs when additional explanation is required during a discourse. In ER #7, T5 requested a clarification, so that he would not misunderstand the other teacher.
After receiving the answer for Dental clinic, F5 tried to point out that the Book store was next to the Dental clinic. However, T5 got confused as to which side of the Dental clinic was the Bookstore's location. As a result, T5 requested a clarification by stating 'In the left hand side?' for more explanation.

F5
In North Street what place? First in the corner, the first place is what teacher?

F5
Next to the dental clinic is book store.

T5
In the left hand side?

F5
Right side is book store. Dental clinic and the right is book store.

F5
Next to the book store is what teacher? What is the next place? Another example occurred in ER #8 (8) While discussing the advantages of having friends, T4 stated that people need friends the most when they were in danger. However, F4 did not understand and requested a clarification by asking 'What do you mean?' In turn, T4 gave him a clearer explanation.

F4
So, it's really important to have friends.

T4
Yes. And I think in case of when we are in danger.

F4
What do you mean?

T4
I mean in danger. For example: one time, I stay alone in my room, so someone called me, and Knock knock the door I don't know who. A little bit dangerous for me because there are strangers around the apartment so I called my friends to stay with me.

Listen to the message
Listen to the message is a strategy that helps individuals developed a rapport with each other. The utterance of 'right', while the other partner is speaking, provides confirmation that one is listening. Listen to the message strategy was used the most by both the Thai and Filipino teachers.
(9) In ER #9, F3 and T3 were discussing about which profession was the hardest to achieve financial success. T3 uttered 'right' as she listened to her interlocutor, which encourage a smooth conversational flow as F3 was talking.

F3
Same in our country, we don't usually do dancing. Mostly,… T3 (right).

F3
…You need to do the coordination of your body… T3 (oh, right).

T3
So the next one we are going to painting. How difficult is it to be successful in this profession? What do you think?
F3 I think you need to have talent in drawing.

Participant paraphrase
This strategy is used when individuals paraphrase themselves to help repair the breakdown in the conversation, and also when they realizes that their interlocutors could not understand the question.
(10) While filling-in the town map, T4 did not understand F4's pronunciation of the word 'minimart'. F4 adopted the strategy in order to explain what the English description of the word 'minimart' was through exemplification. ER #10 demonstrated a combination of two strategies: the request clarification strategy by T4 and the participant paraphrase strategy by F4.

T4
And the middle. What is the middle?

F4
The middle one for me is police station T4 Yes.
F4 Yes, minimart. It's like a small Big C, 7-11. So across the main street, I have here a school and movie theater. I have 3 blanks. I have 3 spaces.

T4
I have 2 blank spaces. The first one is post office.

Participant prompt
ER #11 provided an illustration of using the Participant prompt strategy to reassure the ideas that are intended to be portrayed by the sender as received by the target. After T5's two second pause, F5 would then try to help by providing a possible answer for T5. This is further evidence of the collaborative and supportive atmosphere, which has also been noted in other lingua franca contexts.
(11) While discussing T5's part-time job as a singer, he explained that he did not often mingle after finishing work, for he often spent his nightly earnings on friends. He could not think of an appropriate word to complete his sentence. So, after a two second pause, F5 prompted T5 by providing a possible answer 'To pay for them?'

T5
In my opinion, if I have a lot of friends at the night job, I have to spend the money, I have to waste the money. If I earn 900, I have to… (After a two second pause)

F5
To pay for them?

T5
No, no, no! To share.

F5
Because that's what friends do, right? For example, you want to buy some food, we have to share T5 (uh, huh).

Brush off (Communicative Delayed Response Syndrome) CDRS
(12) F4 started the conversation by reading the question 'Which profession is it most difficult to get to the top?' T4 avoided answering by deflecting the question back to F4 for her answered. T4 later stated in the stimulated recall interview that she needed more time and an example in order to help formulate her response.

F4
Which profession is it most difficult to get to the top?

Language switching
ER #13 provides an example of Language switching. This occurs when participants switch to their first language during interactions.
(13) F5 and T5 were helping each other to complete the town maps. Some part of the conversation showed that T5 unintentionally injected some Thai words into the conversations even though he was able to communicate the idea in English at that time. T5 stated that he believed his utterance of the Thai phrase did not affect the conversation, which helped him feel comfortable with his interlocutor, and did not make him feel he needed to pretend to speak exemplary English. However, he also stated that he will not inject any Thai utterances, words, or phrases into his future conversation with unfamiliar native English speaker; since, they might lead to misunderstandings. This strategy was seen the most during the Jigsaw task, and provided a more relax conversational atmosphere than that of the other two more formal speaking tasks.

F5
The corner is T5 Japanese restaurant.

F5
Across is. The corner down is school. ER #14 is also a good example of Language switching. T1 tended to speak English the entire time of the experiment; nevertheless, she unintentionally used some Thai words and utterances, which did not affect the context of the conversation.
(14) While now feeling more comfortable around Filipino teachers, T1 applied Code-mixing in her conversation since she was sure that her interlocutor understood her utterances. In this scenario, while T1 tried to determine a location on the map, she unintentionally injected Thai utterances 'magee', 'Chaimai' and 'si' during the conversation. Note that the utterance 'si', is a form of communicative strategies which Thai used informally among themselves when feeling comfortable.

T1
And the… teacher magee (earlier, just a few moments ago-a Thai language injection) you tell me down chaimai (right?)

T1
Spell coffee for me si (it's an utterance word to urge someone to do something) teacher

Spell out the word
There are moments in a conversation when certain words cannot be understood by the listeners. This signals for one of the listeners to request the spelling of the word. In ER # 15, T4 could not understand what the place was so the strategy of spelling out the word was requested.
(15) This extract showed a conversation in the Jigsaw task. T4 wanted to know, what the blank space on the town map was, so F4 answered, it's the movie theater. Moreover, F4 also gave her a definition of Movie Theater to make sure that T4 would get the answer. However, T4 could not understand his pronunciation of 'movie theater', so she asked F4 to spell the word 'movie theater'.

F4
The third one is a movie theater where can watch the movie.

Be explicit
In some conversation, a word can have ambiguous meaning and the need to clarify it may arise. In ER #16, F2 sensed that T2 might not understand the word 'professions' and immediately provided the word 'teacher' to assist T2. She paraphrased her question and made it more explicit for her interlocutor to understand the meaning.
(16) F2 started the speaking task by reading the question 'How difficult it is to be successful in these professions?' However, she knew that her interlocutor had a lower English proficiency than the others, so she explicitly let T2 knows what she really meant by changing the word 'profession' to 'teacher' in the hope that T2 would be able to answer the question. Nevertheless, T2 still could not give a suitable answer to F2.

F2
How difficult it is to be successful in these professions? I meant, how difficult to be a teacher?
T2 I want to be a teacher, a good teacher.

F2
Have you ever tried to teach Art? T2 I cannot draw.

Self-Lexical correction
(17) T5 corrected himself by using the more appropriate word 'fired' instead of 'resign' to accurately portray the meaning of his experience. Note that T5 did not exactly answer F5's question about his experience working at the school but instead gave an answer regarding his past work history experience. The interaction worked smoothly as F5 was able to adjust to the response.

F5
How is your experience teaching here?

Non-verbal language
(18) In ER #18, while T1 and F1 introduced themselves, T1 adopted the non-verbal language strategy by gently poking F1 on the arm to indicate that she finished speaking, which was a signal for F1 to continue the discussion.

T1
Hello, I'm Sine, and I'm from Thailand. I'm a co-teacher at Anubanmuang Uthaithani school. I work at here 6 years (T1 poked F1 to continue the conversation)

F1
I came here in Thailand since 2013 and I started teaching here in…my first school is in Phichit and my first school is in Kamphangphet my third school is where I am now. I take long here teaching because I love teaching Maths subject and that is my favorite subject.
(19) T2 and F2 were supposed to discuss about the most difficult profession to get to the top, but they did not since T2 could not express herself toward the question. Even though, F2 stated the question 'In which profession is it most difficult to get to the top?' for two times, T2 still talked about her singing and liking car racing. T2 mimed a steering wheel in order to support her speech. She gestured as if she was driving to make sure that her interlocutor understood her perfectly. However, F2 did not give up on the conversation. She expressed her opinion about lawyers being the most difficult profession to rise to the top. After a long pause, she asked the question again, but this time she rephrased the idea of the question so it could be understood easier. T2 finally understood and said 'Art' is the most difficult one and also pointing at the artist drawing a painting.

T2
I can sing but not good. I think I like race (T2 mimed holding a steering wheel as if driving a car).

F2
For me, I think it's a lawyer. You need to study a lot, right? (After a long pause) And then, how about the difficult one?
T2 Art (while pointing at the artist drawing a painting).
Participants would occasionally smile and giggle while talking. In ER #20, T2 smiled and giggled in response to the question, indicating that she was not confident in responding to the question and was afraid of being ridiculed for answering incorrectly. Additionally, participants also liked to smile and giggle in order to support and encourage their interlocutors and put them at ease.
(20) While discussing about professions in the speaking task, F2 insisted that T2 talk about each profession. She asked if T2 has ever met anyone who was good at dancing, and then T2 pointed at the picture of a Ballerina and smiled, giggled and looked at F2 to signal that she either did not know anyone, or she did not know how to respond to the question. F2 helped her out by saying 'no' with a raised intonation to support T2 not knowing anyone instead of T2 not being able to respond to the question. F2 suddenly change the subject to painting, and T2 who understood this question, answered the question 'I don't know' to state that she did not know anyone good at painting.

F2
Ok, have you ever met someone good at dancing? Ballet dancing?

F2
No. (In a rising tone implying that she believed T2 did not know anyone) (F2 then asked the question injecting an alternative topic.) How about painting? Do you know someone good at painting? T2 I don't know.

Persuasion
The Persuasion strategy is an important part of communication in the ELF context as it encourages the interlocutors to continue speaking. ER #21, 22, and 23 provided some examples of the Persuasion strategy.
(21) In ER #21, they were talking about the most difficult profession to get to the top. T2 had a lower English proficiency than the other teachers in this study, so F2 attempted to persuade T2 to talk to keep the conversation going. This was done by F2's continual insistence on T2's interests and experiences. This helped make T2 feel more comfortable which lead to a more productive exchange.

F2
For me, I think it's a lawyer. You need to study a lot, right? And then, how about the difficult one? Persuasion is not only adopted by the person with the higher English proficiency, but also by the more confident individual regardless of their English knowledge. For example, in ER #22 and 23, F1 had a higher proficiency in English, but she was more of an introvert. T1 had to induce F1 into a conversation because F1 had a timid personality.
(22) In this extract, T1 and F1 were trying to complete the town map. After getting the answer from F1, T1 induced the discussion along by questiong what F1 needed next.

T1
I want to know the left hand in the first street on the top.

F1
On the top. Ok, that is Bank.

T1
Thank you. What do you want to know?

F1
I want to know the place beside the bank at the right side.
(23) When T1 filled in the blank spaces located on Central Street in the town map, she insisted F1 to re-ask the question again by saying 'so you ask me and I can tell you'.

T1
Right now, I'm clear in the central street, so you ask me and I can tell you. Ok. So how about next to the police station. What is that?

Change of topic
The need to change the topic was also revealed in the data. ER #24 shows an example of this. In this exchange, T4 could not keep up with the conversation any longer and suggested they should move on to the next topic.
(24) While discussing the promising field of science, they began talking about the funding for their education; however, T4 wanted to change the topic to one that was more interesting to her.

T4
So, you need to get a scholarship to find.

F4
Oh, yeah! To get a scholarship, you have to be like you have to focus on science because there are a lot of branches in Science. It's very wide.

T4
For me, it's… Can we go to second?

Listeners Speakers
The ELF communicative strategies of Thai and Filipino teachers of English (Table 1) was created by combining the ELF communicative strategies of Kirkpatrick (2010) and the communicative strategies identified in this study. The six strategies discovered other than the strategies that were introduced by Kirkpatrick in this study were Brush off, Language switching, Self-Lexical Correction, Non-verbal language, Change of topic, and Persuasion.
The relevant researches on ELF pragmatics revealed that participants use common interactional approaches like Repetition, Paraphrase, Comprehension checks, Code-switching, Explanations, and Clarifications in their interactions. In comparison, the recent study (Somsai and Interaprasert, 2011) in Thailand showed that Approximation, Circumlocution, Paralinguistic, Avoidance, Appeal for help, and Language switching were highly used by Thais. Similarly, the communicative strategies used the most to cope with language barriers in this study were Listen to the message, Persuasion, and Non-verbal language.
The highest ranking communicative strategies as a listener for both Thai and Filipino teachers was Listen to the message strategy. Kirkpatrick (2010) stated, "When listeners are focused on the topic the speaker is talking about during the conversation; even though, the pattern of speech or words may be used in a non-standard form" the message is usually clear, which increases the communication flow and provides for comfortable environments. The strategy that was generally used by most of the participants was Request clarification, which was ranked the second highest.
Base on the stimulated recalled interviews; the participants requested a clarification for more information when they encountered unfamiliar English words or sentences by the raising intonation in their question statement. It could be reasoned that language learners sometimes need this strategy in order to reach a mutual understanding.
The highest ranked communicative strategy by the Filipino teachers was Persuasion. Based on the transcriptions, the interlocutors who had a lower proficiency in English would seek help during their conversations. By contrast, the individuals who had a higher proficiency in English would attempt to persuade their interlocutor to continue their input of the conversation. The Persuasion strategy was an important strategy for the participant to help move the conversation along. This strategy was not only adopted by individuals with a higher level of English proficiency, but also included individuals that were more confident in their actions regardless of their English knowledge. This strategy seems necessary for ELF discourse development, workplace advancement, and community encouragement in order to avoid gaps in conversations, which provide interlocutors to feel free to talk. Pornpibul (2005) proposed that during his interviews, several students confirmed that they had a tendency to use Appeal for help the most; where, they could ask for help either verbally or nonverbally. The Persuasion strategy seemed slightly similar to Pornpibul's Appeal for help. However, the difference was that while the Persuasion strategy was used by the senders to obtain support; the Appeal for help strategy was applied by the receivers to gain help regardless of who they asked for help.
The Non-verbal language strategy was ranked highest for the Thai teachers. It is also effective in showing intention, conveying feelings, communicating messages, offering support, showcasing personalities, indicating a desired action, and even deescalating tension among individuals. Pornpibul (2005) proposed that Non-linguistic signal is particularly suitable for dealing with unfamiliar English words.
Additionally, Non-verbal language was viewed comparably to Using non-verbal expressions discovered by Somsai and Interaprssert (2011) who mentioned that Using non-verbal expressions strategies is likely to be significant for language learners when they encounter oral communication problems. In this study, participants would smile and giggle in response to certain questions, indicating that they did not know how to answer the question. In addition, they would also smile and giggled in order to support and encourage their interlocutors. Wang (2009) pointed out that facial expressions, body postures, gestures, and movements are signals that reflect a message that correlates with oral sounds. Using non-verbal language seemed to be significant for language learners when encountering periods of communication breakdown, particularly when getting a message across linguistic boundaries is essential. Gullberg (2006) mentioned that gestures are exploited to solve lexical problems.
Also prevalent in this study, the Language switching strategy impacted all participants during their dialogue. Wannaruk (2003) noted that Language switching was mostly used by lower proficiency learners. Thai teachers in this study believed their unintentional injection of a few Thai words or utterances did not affect the overall meaning of the conversation. It is similar to one of the three functions that Cogo (2009) illustrated to show that Code-switching draws on issues of cultural and social identity. Moreover, Gross (2000) and Myers-Scotton (2000) asserted that Code-switching from a sociolinguistic perspective is an expression of the bilingual or multilingual competence and not of their deficiency. Thus, Language switching in this study might be viewed slightly different from language switching and Code-switching in previous Thai studies. Additionally, Qian et al. (2009) indicated that this strategy is a discourse strategy that can be used to promote interaction of language learners while also helping cultivate and reinforce good habits of language learning.
There was a statistically significant relationship between communicative strategies used by the Thai and Filipino teachers based on the cultural diversities of nationality. It could be assumed that their nationalities affected their approach to the uses of communicative strategies as a result of the communitive arrangement of their work responsibilities, subject context, and environments. This was particularly evident, as they often shared the same ideas during their discussion, actively used the same listening and speaking approach, which promoted the idea that ethnicity and social networks influenced their language. According to Holmes (2008), when people interact with each other in the same group, they often speak similarly. In other words, each person's speech patterns tend to converge towards the speech patterns of the person they are talking to. This process is called speech accommodation (Giles and Smith, 1979). Thus, it implies that using the same pronunciation, patterns of speech, and the similar vocabulary is a way of signaling that people in the group are effectively communicating their ideas and feeling to accommodate each other. Kirkpatrick (2010) mentioned that the English language classroom could become a place where a major focus is on 'collaborative cross-cultural communication' and where a lingua franca approach to language teaching could be adopted. Furthermore, Dornyei (1995) and Natakani (2006) also focused on identifying the effect of training communication strategies on speaking performances since academic teaching profession lacks sufficient communication strategies. ELF communicative competence should be emphasized and practiced in classrooms through application of the varieties of language tasks that motivate learners to utilize the communicative strategies with other ELF speakers. These communicative strategies should be advocated and implemented into English curriculums in order to encourage teachers and students to successfully communicate with both native and non-native interlocutors The pedagogical techniques recommendations that arise from this study are designed to improve communicative strategies among teachers. These strategies should begin with educators by promoting the idea of the Professional Learning Community (PLC). Secondly, English courses should incorporate non-native English content, which will encourage learners to put more effort to reach communicative competence regarding non-native English content. Additionally, there should be Teamwork tasks which allow for the sharing of ideas through uninterrupted controlled dialogue that improves communication.
More studies should be conducted which focus on the interaction between teachers and students; teachers with other non-native nationalities and students; and students and students, who are at the early stage of English language learnings using this study's framework. Group discussion tasks are highly recommended for further researches because they have the potential benefit of creating a more robust communication environment. Any-time recordings are recommended for data collection as they may help the participants feel more comfortable and less nervous. These potential studies may give different results.
As mentioned earlier, the communicative strategies proposed by previous studies and ELF communicative strategies in this study could be useful guidelines for ELF curriculum designs in Thailand. Baker (2012) mentioned that L2 users need to understand L2 communication as a cultural process and to be aware of their own culturally based communicative behavior and that of others. Therefore, English language teaching (ELT) should involve local and different cultural contents not just standard native English norms. This will allow learners to utilize the communicative strategies into their daily life. Educators and teachers of English should apply the principles of teaching ELF communicative strategies through local and different cultural contents into their English curriculum rather than the old method of teaching standard native English. Lastly, English language users should never stop learning. This will allow the individuals to adapt to the variations of thought, speech, and word patterns that English speakers may present during a dialogue, and accommodate one's language with whoever speaks English.